Chutney podi

Ingredients:

1. 1 cup Urad dal
2. 2 cups Chana dal
3. 2 cups dried coconut (Copra). Can reduce if you like hot and spicy chutney podi.
4. 15-20 dried red chillies. Or equivalent hot chili powder.
5. Optional for more red color: 2 Tsp Bedige/Kashmiri chilli powder.
6. 20-30 curry leaves. Wash and pat them dry. Equivalent dried curry leaves or curry leaf power is also fine.
7. 1/2 tsp Asefotida (hing)
8. 1 cup Jaggery. Kids will like if added. Reduce to 1tbsp otherwise.
9. 1 tsp coconut oil to fry chillies. Pressed oil is best. Anything else will also do.
10. 1 golf ball size de-seeded tamarind.
11. 2-3 cloves garlic. This is absolutely optional. I love this flavour and do it this way sometimes. You can retain the skin.
12. 1 tbsp salt. Tata salt :).

Process:

Dry roast Chana dal on a medium flame. Do this first as the dal is bigger, more volume and takes times to cool down. The dal should turn a light tan in colour and should’ve lost all moisture by now. Spread it out on a large plate or baking tray. Newspapers will also do just fine :P.

Dry roast Urad dal on a medium flame. You can used urad with or without skin, split or whole. Just note that skin on the dal will burn if you don’t constantly attend to the roasting process. The aroma of roasted urad dal is just amazing. When done, drop the roasted urad dal on the previously spread chana dal. Air it out so all the moisture escapes.

Reduce flame to low and roast the copra till it gets oily and slightly brown. Collect this copra into a separate steel plate. This is where you’ll also collect chillies, curry leaves, hing and garlic.

Warm(just warm) 1 tsp coconut oil, reduce to a low flame. Roughly crush(not cut/paste) and drop in the garlic cloves. Keep stirring till the garlic stops sizzling. Take the garlic out and set aside. If you want to add the garlic to the powder mix, the powder should be finished within a month. I use this garlic as garnish on jeera rice or dal within 2 days.

If using fresh curry leaves, in that same garlic infused oil, drop curry leaves and continue heating on low flame. Be careful as the oil splutters on contact with leaves. Wait for the splutter to stop and take our the leaves, set them on roasted copra. Leave the oil in the pan.

If warm chillies make you sneeze or cough, rub some fresh ghee(clarified-butter)/oil on your nose and eyes. The fats help trap/dilute capsaisin build-up and preserves your chef-ly dignity. Steps in the next paragraph need to happen quickly, one ingredient over another. So keep the ingredients handy, read the next para fully and just dive into it.

In that same oil, heat the dry red chillies. Constantly stir to prevent burning or smoking. Believe it or not, you’ll actually smell an aroma from those chillies when they turn dark red. Drop in the Bedige/Kashmiri chilli powder, hing and stir for 5 seconds, all the powder should have roasted. If you’re using dry curry leaves or curry leaf power, drop that in at this stage and stir for 5 seconds.

Clear out the pan on to plate with copra. Let both sets cool to room temperature. Use this time to crush and clear the jaggery. Jaggery may have small pebbles that can be felt on fingertips. Also de-seed the tamarind and remove as much fiber as you can. Drop both of them with salt into a mixie jar. I use the small masala jar so the job is quick. If you use the bigger mixie jars, you’ll run it for longer to work all the dal but heats and cook the powder while running the mixie. Especially with the copra, there’s a tendency for the mix to form lumps. So use the small jar and quickly finish in small batches.

Drop some of the chana/urad dal on top and grind this into a coarse powder. Don’t make a fine powder. Fine powders don’t add any texture. But if you don’t like dal sticking to teeth, go ahead and make it a fine powder. Next, powder the copra and oily stuff(chillies, curry leaves, hing, chilli powder) with some chana/urad dal. Finally powder the remaining chana/urad dal. Mix all the powder as evenly as you can.

Don’t bother testing for salt…. Chutney podi isn’t about the salt. It is about the sesame/peanut oil that you’ll lace with this powder and then coat on your idlis.

Happy Chutney podi folks!